flickrfs-users

[Flickrfs-users] filesystem layout

[Paul P. <pe...@ee...>]

FlickrFS is really cool, but after playing around with it a bit I feel
like it's also missing some pieces.  It would be nice if there were a
direct interface into the photostream, as well as a way to edit the
metadata directly.  I'd like to suggest one possible filesystem layout,
just for the sake of discussion:

------------------------------------------------------------------------
/flickrfs_mount
   stream/
      metadata/
         photo\ title\ 1/
            tags        # ASCII file containing list of tags
            sets        # ASCII file containing sets for this photo
            description # ASCII file containing photo description
         photo\ title\ 2/
            tags
            sets
            description
         photo\ title\ 3/
            tags
            sets
            description
         ...
      photo\ title\ 1   # jpeg files
      photo\ title\ 2
      photo\ title\ 3
      ...
   tags/
      ...      # as implemented currently
   sets/
      ...      # as implemented currently
------------------------------------------------------------------------

So the idea here is that the stream/ directory is sort of a primary
interface, with a metadata/ subdir that lets the user change the
metadata for any of the photos.  (It would be even nicer to have a
ReiserFS 4-style system for handling metadata...)  Dropping a new photo
into stream/ should (1) upload the file and (2) add blank entries to the
proper location in stream/metadata/ .

Note that I'm no filesystem expert, so I'm pretty clueless when it comes
to the technical limitations of something like this.

Also, it feels a bit inelegant to have to set the permissions of a photo
*before* copying it into the flickr FS.  It would be nice to be able to
change the permissions on pre-existing photos in-place.

Paul

Re: [Flickrfs-users] filesystem layout

[Manish R. J. <man...@gm...>]

On 11/11/05, Paul Pelzl <pe...@ee...> wrote:
>
>
> FlickrFS is really cool, but after playing around with it a bit I feel
> like it's also missing some pieces. It would be nice if there were a
> direct interface into the photostream, as well as a way to edit the
> metadata directly. I'd like to suggest one possible filesystem layout,
> just for the sake of discussion:
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> /flickrfs_mount
> stream/
> metadata/
> photo\ title\ 1/
> tags # ASCII file containing list of tags
> sets # ASCII file containing sets for this photo
> description # ASCII file containing photo description
> photo\ title\ 2/
> tags
> sets
> description
> photo\ title\ 3/
> tags
> sets
> description
> ...
> photo\ title\ 1 # jpeg files
> photo\ title\ 2
> photo\ title\ 3
> ...
> tags/
> ... # as implemented currently
> sets/
> ... # as implemented currently
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> So the idea here is that the stream/ directory is sort of a primary
> interface, with a metadata/ subdir that lets the user change the
> metadata for any of the photos. (It would be even nicer to have a
> ReiserFS 4-style system for handling metadata...) Dropping a new photo
> into stream/ should (1) upload the file and (2) add blank entries to the
> proper location in stream/metadata/ .



It will be desirable that, the metadata information can be edited easily,
for a whole lot of photos. For e.g. adding a new tag 'tag1', can be easily
updated for all the photos in the set. So, I think in that case, it will be
more useful if the files containing metadata be 1 file per image. For image
named 'img1', the metadata file will be named '.img1' (<dot>img1), and exis=
t
in the same directory as the image itself. So, this will also remain hidden
from the user, so as to avoid any cluttering, while on the other hand,
allows using grep, sed scripts to do a mass change on all the .*.meta
(metadata) files.

Note that I'm no filesystem expert, so I'm pretty clueless when it comes
> to the technical limitations of something like this.
>
> Also, it feels a bit inelegant to have to set the permissions of a photo
> *before* copying it into the flickr FS. It would be nice to be able to
> change the permissions on pre-existing photos in-place.


Next version will allow that.

Paul


Nice ideas Paul :).

Regards
Manish


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Re: [Flickrfs-users] filesystem layout

[Paul P. <pe...@ee...>]

On Fri, Nov 11, 2005 at 01:51:38PM +0800, Manish Rai Jain wrote:
> > FlickrFS is really cool, but after playing around with it a bit I feel
> > like it's also missing some pieces. It would be nice if there were a
> > direct interface into the photostream, as well as a way to edit the
> > metadata directly. I'd like to suggest one possible filesystem layout,
> > just for the sake of discussion:
<snip>

> It will be desirable that, the metadata information can be edited easily,
> for a whole lot of photos. For e.g. adding a new tag 'tag1', can be easily
> updated for all the photos in the set. So, I think in that case, it will be
> more useful if the files containing metadata be 1 file per image. For image
> named 'img1', the metadata file will be named '.img1' (<dot>img1), and exist
> in the same directory as the image itself. So, this will also remain hidden
> from the user, so as to avoid any cluttering, while on the other hand,
> allows using grep, sed scripts to do a mass change on all the .*.meta
> (metadata) files.

Using a dotfile for the metadata makes a lot of sense.  I'm not sure
that I agree about putting all the metadata in a single file, however.
The file would need to be organized somehow (XML or whatever) and then
you risk having the user accidentally break the file structure and screw
up the metadata in a bad way.

I think I would be happier with having one .imgN/ (or .imgN.meta/)
directory for each photo, and using separate files inside that directory
for each piece of metadata.


> > Also, it feels a bit inelegant to have to set the permissions of a photo
> > *before* copying it into the flickr FS. It would be nice to be able to
> > change the permissions on pre-existing photos in-place.
> 
> Next version will allow that.

Great!


> Nice ideas Paul :).

It's an interesting problem, how to map flickr functionality on to a FS.
I wish I had more time to actually help work on it, instead of just
feeding you ideas. :-)

Paul